Have you heard my cougar joke? No. How do you
keep a cougar out of your backyard? Install a
set of goalposts. There it is. There it is. Mitch,
do not put that joke on the podcast. Welcome
to County Connection. the official podcast of
the Washington State Association of Counties,
where we dive into the legislative issues shaping
the future of our communities. From budgets to
public safety, infrastructure to elections, we'll
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it impacts counties from across the Evergreen
State. Stay informed, stay engaged, and join
us as we amplify the voice of Washington's 39
counties. Welcome back, everybody, to the County
Connection podcast, the official podcast for
the Washington State Association of Counties.
It's the legislative session. I'm Paul Jewell,
your government affairs director for WASAC. And
I'm here in the booth on Friday afternoon. What
is it? Day five. Day five. Beautiful Friday.
Yeah, it's a gorgeous Friday afternoon. And we're.
In the studio. I know. Having a chat. But there's
a window behind me, behind you. Well, it's actually
behind me. You're the one behind me. I get to
look at it, though. You've got the view. Not
that I get you and the window. Yeah, I'm sorry
about that. It's a win -win. It's a win -win.
Yeah, you have to say that because I'm within
punching distance. You are. You're still in that.
Well, Brad, you cover public safety and human
services for us. You haven't been here in the
studio having a conversation with me since. last
session yeah it's been a while yeah so you're
back um do we do these during the interim well
i do okay yeah i mean i listened to all those
yeah they were great you remember the one my
favorite was the one in august thanks brad yeah
thanks brad yeah i appreciate that um you uh
obviously added to our listener uh uh list over
the of course over the interim um no we yeah
we do them just Just not quite as frequently.
And we're not always talking about legislative
stuff. Right. We try to do some other things.
There's plenty of other county things going on.
Yeah. Like what's going on in counties and what's
cool in counties. We did a lot of those. And
there actually are some really interesting ones.
And we had some cool guest speakers, too. Oh,
really? Yeah. So, you know, if you want to reeducate
yourself. Yeah, maybe I'll go look through the
back catalog and see what. Believe it or not,
there's 50 of them. Whoa. Wow. We really. Yeah.
We did 50 last year. That's impressive. That's
crazy. That is crazy. And you think about it.
Yeah. That's almost one per week. Yeah. Wow.
I know. Pretty rad. I know. I'm excited for that.
Yeah. Good. Well, here we go. It's almost like
we're old hats at this. I was going to say now
it's not even novel anymore. The question is,
is anyone listening? Well, we'll find out. I
guess we will. Say a few interesting things and
we'll find out. I'm not listening in the summer.
Clearly not. Clearly. Well, Brad, what are your
impressions so far? How is the session going?
You know, it's interesting, right? I mean, you
never quite know what to expect when you come
into a new session. And I think we knew there
were going to be budget issues and we knew there
was going to be a tight time frame. I think we
were – I was kind of excited to see. a new administration
in their first, I mean, I know last session was
technically their first, but, you know, Governor
Ferguson had just been elected, and so they kind
of walk into it midstream, and it's still a little
bit of the, you know, Inslee's kind of leftover
stuff, and he kind of has to inherit, you know
what I mean? Yeah, well, it was such a big change
last year, right? I mean, the Senate really shifted.
It did. A ton of House members went to the Senate,
so there was a lot of turnover. There were a
lot of Senate folks, well, several of them ran
for statewide elected office. That's right. Some
won, some didn't. Yep. But you had a lot in those
races. You saw, you know, some of the more seasoned
veterans, you know, kind of gracefully exit.
That's right. We had some really sad kind of
deaths last year that also affected the makeup.
And then the house had a ton of new members.
A lot of churn in the house. Yeah. And a lot
of those members were pretty. eager you know
last year when they got started unfortunately
they saw all the building hit kind of a brick
wall they did it was a hard year to start yeah
that's a tough year 10 years it's my first year
as a legislator and oh we're you know we're in
a major budget right there's no money yeah no
money so it was a it was a tough year to get
started and here they're all back yep um but
it still feels kind of new it does i think well
you know it's funny i mean a lot of people were
kind of uh You know, there seemed to be this
weird reaction, not just in terms of the shift
in the legislature, which happens, you know,
periodically as we have elections. But I think
the governor's office, people were like, oh,
so -and -so is leaving this agency. So -and -so
is going over here. Yeah. And people were acting
like it was this really kind of dramatic thing.
And I think that's what I was just going to say.
I think people forgot. Right. This is actually
pretty normal. Yeah. This is what happens. In
the old days, it was like every four or eight
years. Exactly. A new administration. Exactly.
But here it had been 12. 12 years. So I think
people just forgot that, yeah, this, a lot of,
you know, oh, so -and -so's, all right, well,
you know, it's a change of administration. Yeah.
It's not like, you know. That's normal. Right.
This is what we should have expected. So, yeah.
And it also goes to show there were a lot of
baked -in personalities, right, at that point
that have been doing these things at agencies
that we've all been working with for a while.
For more than a decade. Right. Yeah. So I think
that was the, maybe some of the discomfort. It's
like, oh, we're. We have a known quantity here,
and now we've got to try something new. So, yeah,
I'm excited to kind of see how that continues
to play out. Definitely there has been a lot
happening nationally, right? And so I think particularly
in the public safety kind of human services space.
Well, you're kind of uniquely positioned, right,
for that interplay. There really is a lot going
on right now nationally and on the state level
where there's friction being caused. I sat in
a hearing today in labor, and it was a bill.
that we're supporting wasn't a concern for us.
We had a couple issues we wanted to talk about,
but it had to do with notifying immigrant workers
if the employer got notified that there was going
to be an I -9 audit. Oh, that's right. I remember
this one. Yeah, we talked about this. And there
was some really passionate testimony. I'm sure.
And there was some passionate testimony from
some employers who basically made the charge,
hey, you're putting us in the middle of your
battle between the state government, and the
federal government, and that's not fair. Now,
we didn't necessarily see it that way. We didn't
take that position, but that was some of the
testimony that I heard. And I have a feeling
that that's not going to be an unusual kind of
opinion as we look at some of these proposals.
And you've got a couple that are right front
and center around law enforcement and human services.
Yeah, I would say right out of the gate. So,
yeah, I mean, I agree with you. I'm not surprised.
We're sort of seeing this battle of, kind of
right in front of us, right? Between, you know,
what it means to be a decentralized country in
terms of states and the federal government. I
do think, you know, interestingly in this, I
mean, in the human services and kind of behavioral
health space, right? A lot of that started with
the big, beautiful bill, right? HR1. And so we
started seeing a lot of consternation building
in terms of what's the impact going to be in
that environment. And just in case you've been
living under a rock somewhere, the big, beautiful
bill was the first bill of the... Trump administration
on the federal level, not a state bill. And did
a lot of sweeping things, particularly in the
human services and Medicaid space, right? And
so as counties are... you know, all over the
map in that space doing a variety of services.
There was a lot of angst and concern around sort
of what's the impact going to be? How are we
going to look? And it was such a slow rollout
and there was legal, you know, challenges going
on. And so we're still, I think, trying to assess
what the impacts are. And it was impacts on food
benefits? It runs the gamut, yeah. Impacts on
Medicare? Yep. Eligibility, I think, really is
what it boiled down to kind of being the biggest
concern. And so then you look at that and go,
okay, well, eligibility, what's the impact of
if we reduce the number? of eligibles. What does
that mean? Well, it means that those folks have
to look elsewhere for services. Oftentimes that's
where, boom, you've got the counties because
we operate so much of that. those social services.
Yeah. We're there close to government. Exactly.
We've got the public health departments, right.
We, you know, are, they're not our emergency
rooms, but community emergency rooms. They're
part of our system. Right. Right. Part of the
system. Right. And so, yeah, so we find ourselves
sort of squarely, you know, I think impacted
by what those, what those decisions may or may
not be as we continue to see the rollout. So
if we stay on that service vein and we stay on
kind of that health services vein, as far as
like Medicare, Medicaid, are there proposals?
Let's let the legislature to do something about
that. And by do something about it, I mean kind
of backfill the cuts or the people who will be
uneligible provide funding for those people to
get services here at the state level. Yeah. I
mean, so the answer, unfortunately, is kind of
a yes and no. Right. I mean, I think the governor's
office really tried to spend a lot of time during
interim actively trying to figure out what the
backup plan was. Right. How do how do we deal
with this? What I mean. I think what complicates
this is what we started talking about earlier,
which is we're in a bad budget environment. And
so there aren't funds that are just sitting around
that we can just go, or at least that the state
can go, oh, okay, we can just plug this hole
over here and plug this hole over here and beef
up this program over here. And so it really is
an unfortunate series of timing, I think, timing
events that have really stressed, I think, the
state in terms of trying to figure out what to
do. There is definitely going to be impact. There's
definitely going to be, I think, I think the
governor's office tried to move money around
and shore up and find dollars that it could use
to potentially. plug some of those holes and
some of those gaps that they anticipate happening.
But the problem is we haven't seen that happen
yet. Right. So are we talking mostly a budget
play then for like, I think it is. I haven't
seen, I mean, on the policy side, I haven't seen
a ton so far this session. Okay. It's actually
kind of quiet on the behavioral health side within
the legislature. I mean, there's definitely,
which is a little unusual because it is sessions.
It's been pretty busy. It is. Right. I mean,
I agree. And I think partly just honestly. so
much of behavioral health is driven by money
that there's no money. And so there really is,
I think a moment of pause happening a little
bit like, okay, there's things we want to do,
but. You know, we can't quite get to it right
now. Well, that's interesting. You know, Brad,
if we stick to the headlines and this idea of
friction between, say, the state and federal
government, you know, we talked about Medicare,
Medicaid kind of snap, food benefits, that sort
of thing on the human services side. The other
big one. Public safety. Yeah, it's the public
safety side. And it's those, you know, the clashes
between immigration and customs enforcement or
what people call ICE and what we're seeing in
communities as far as, you know, quote, I'm using
air quotes, ICE raids. A lot of people don't
necessarily characterize them that way, and I'm
not trying to be political at all about the Immigration
and Customs Enforcement Agency. I'm just saying
the reality is it's been controversial. It's
been in the news a lot. There's been some aggressive
enforcement, admittedly by the Trump administration,
as one of their signature political... And Washington
state is, you know, as a state, our governor
and our state legislature, the majority party,
they're fighting against it. Right. I don't think
you can understand. I mean, you know, I don't
think you can overstate how. You know, it's permeating
everything in the public safety space. Right.
I mean, it is everywhere. It is all over social
media. It's all over the news programs. And it's
every day at the national level, at the local
level, at the state level. I mean, it's just
everywhere. And so, yeah, I mean, I don't I you
know, I think we should have expected that some
of that was going to spill over into this session.
Right. That the legislature was going to want
to take positions and do some posturing. And
and again, I don't mean that negatively, but
just sort of making some statements about how
they feel. They want to be perceived as a legislature,
how Washington State wants to be perceived in
this broader context and discussion that's going
on. And, yeah, I mean, and I think, you know.
If I were a betting guy, I'd say they're going
to pass a bill or two. I think they're going
to pass a lot of bills. On this issue. I think
they're going to pass a lot of bills. And I think
the challenge for us has been, and we kind of
started talking about stuff coming out of left
field, right? I mean, I think, or right down
the heart of the plate. Right down the heart
of the plate, right. These are clear issues that
are not they are making clear what they're trying
to do here. And I don't think anybody has any
ambiguity about what the goal is. Right. At least
from the way some of these bills are drafted.
Right. And so I think it's really putting us
as a county association in an interesting position
to have to kind of walk the fine line between,
I think. you know responsibly not trying to be
overly political right um looking and trying
to look at policies from a dispassionate standpoint
because our members do have strong feelings they
do they are elected officials yeah absolutely
and i know that individually they're probably
going to weigh in and as they should but as an
association it's you know you know i've talked
about this a lot we could get 20 members in the
room we're not going to get a majority opinion.
On a number of things. Right, on this stuff.
And so, you know, we're trying to, what you're
trying to do is kind of navigate in where the
county interests are. Exactly. Perhaps, and try
to make sure that our voice is heard in that
regard without getting... too embroiled in kind
of the passion and the emotion of the politics
surrounding the issue otherwise. I think that's
exactly right. I mean, I think what we're trying
to do as an association is be nuanced and sophisticated,
right? To say, okay, there's going to be a place
for a debate that's got to happen at the state
level, right? And the counties need to be engaged
in that. Yeah. We have to figure out where. And
how we engage, what part of the conversation
is appropriate for us as an association to weigh
in on, and what part do we leave to our individual
members to engage as part of their normal political
process for the jobs that they have. Is there
a proposal or two that you're especially working
on or maybe keep you up at night a little bit?
Yeah, I mean, you know, there's definitely been
some, there's definitely been a lot of conversation
around. Well, I guess we could look at it a couple
ways. If we want to stay in the vein of what's
happening, kind of federal impact and state trying
to respond, I definitely think we're seeing a
lot of effort being put into protecting people's
personal information, people's data, and placing
new requirements on county officials in terms
of, or county staff. In terms of how they interact
with the federal government, right, when the
federal government or when federal agencies are
in town. Right. So, in fact, there's a bill you
and I had worked on just this week talking about
emergency management scenarios. Right. This was
a bill that basically allows local governments
and the governor, I think, to. create these emergency
operations zones, right? That's right. House
Bill 2351, I think, if I recall. Is that the
number? Yep. And we just had a meeting about
it yesterday, as a matter of fact. And the idea
being that within those zones, if you're an emergency
responder and a law enforcement officer is trying
to enforce... against an emergency responder
there is new protocol that's exactly right rather
than them just being able to come in and disrupt
what's happening as far as the emergency operations
go there is new protocol there are there are
systems that are going to be put in place that
they must follow if they're going to actually
do that exactly and i think what's fascinating
about this to some on some level is i don't know
a couple years ago if anyone would have envisioned
these type of conversations right but wasn't
there an incident at the bear gulch fire or something
that's exactly i do think that's that's where
this is coming from yeah for sure but but it
all feels a little bit new territory, right?
Like we're all kind of engaging in scenarios
that, you know, and I think in some of these
bills, right, they're... They're looking or they're
almost anticipatory bills, right? Like, well,
a scenario could happen. Right. And if it does
happen, we want this policy in place when it
does. Right. Even though it may never. Right.
And we already have really important policies
in Washington that, you know, whether you like
them or not, they're there and they can be controversial
ones to keep Washington working. That's right.
Right. And the one that we're talking about right
now, what was the bill number again? 2351. House
Bill 2351. That one actually parallels a lot.
It does. The Washington, Keep Washington Working
Act. Keep Washington Working is definitely woven
into these. Yeah, but it just deals with, okay,
these are emergency responders and it's a little
bit different scenario. That's right. And we're
seeing, you know, we see a similar focus on law
enforcement, right? I mean. Just law enforcement
in general? Well, I mean, in terms of how law
enforcement is interacting not only with the
community, but interacting potentially with federal
agents if they are to come into the state and
are. performing actions, right? And so I think
there's this sort of renewed interest in, I mean,
if you recall last session, right, we had a really,
I think, sort of public safety forward session
in terms of wanting to support law enforcement.
Certainly that was a key component of Governor
Ferguson's first ask. Yeah, he said it right
in his first speech. He said, I want $100 million.
And he got his $100 million. And I want it specifically
to hire more cops. That's right. That's right.
And so I feel like we've kind of done that, and
now we're maybe swinging back the other way a
little bit in terms of, well, what are we doing
to make sure we're controlling the power and
authority that these individuals have and keeping
them accountable to not only themselves and the
systems that they work within, but to the public
that they serve. And I do think there's friction.
There's certainly friction at the state and federal
level, but I do think there's now friction between
the state and local level as well in terms of
the best way to do that. And so I think it's
going to take a lot of hard – we're going to
have a lot of hard conversations. There's already
been some spicy testimony this week in a number
of committees around a lot of these issues because
they bring out a lot of passion and personal
interest. And it's been really hot. hotly contested
testimony. I don't know if that's the right word,
but really passionate, very aggressive testimony.
Spicy. I like spicy. It's spicy, right? It's
spicy. Yeah. And it's not just been from people
coming to testify. It's been between members.
Exactly. As well. I mean, there's been some really
pointed questions. There's been some pretty.
Adamant statements. Some surprising, actually.
People really digging in and getting vocal on
stuff. Well, as we kind of wind this up a little
bit, Brad, we've got a few more minutes. Are
there any other – you kind of mentioned the one
bill. Any others you want to mention before we
get out of here? You know, there's a few things.
Maybe it might be worth mentioning the issues
around the toxicology lab, the state toxicology
lab. This is something that's come up a few times
during session. the state uh washington state
patrol runs a statewide lab that counties all
use counties and cities frankly all use uh to
process all of their um physical evidence right
that they may so In the case of – if we do a
simple example, obviously DNA is in there, everything
else. But for example – Blood tests. Blood tests,
breath, any of these kind of things, so DUI cases,
et cetera, et cetera. These all have to go to
the tox lab for – and we have a really excellent
tox lab in Washington State. That's one thing
we're actually known for nationally is having
a really excellent set of individuals that do
this work. The problem is it's not big enough,
and we're seeing a tremendous backlog in getting
these cases. adjudicated. And the result is we're
seeing some cases, and it's happening a lot in
the DUI space, where they're running up against
their statute of limitations and ultimately being
dismissed. So they're not even getting their
toxicology processed in time. Their prosecutors
are having to dismiss the cases or request that
they be dismissed because they can't get the
evidence in time. Well, that's a huge problem.
It's a huge problem. And so this bill tries to
give an option to counties to try to pay for
some of this themselves in some outside labs,
using outside independent labs. That creates
a whole hornet's nest of a problem on its own
on some level. But really, I think the concern
from our end is it's a shift, right? There's
a shift of funding responsibility over to the
county. Well, yeah, I mean, if we're, quote,
unquote, given the opportunity to use an outside
lab, where's the incentive for the state? To
continue to fund the tax law. Yeah, right. Exactly.
And I also think on it. Oh, sorry. Go ahead.
Well, and just the political problem associated
with, you know, which ones do you choose to send
versus which ones do you not choose to send?
I mean, it becomes an access to justice issue
or a speedy trial issue. I've been using the
term. It's a it's a. Yeah, and that would be
a disaster. gets us where we want to go in the
long run on this. So that's definitely one we'll
be watching, engaging on. It has some both policy
and fiscal implications, I think, for counties
that are pretty serious. Yeah, I feel like we
could talk about that one for the next 25 minutes.
We probably could. Yeah. And I think we will
be probably in future podcasts as it continues
to go through the process. But yeah, there's
a lot of work going around for the attorney general
office as well. A lot of kind of adjusting and
revisiting kind of the powers of the AG's office.
That'll be bills that we continue to sort of
engage on and look. They're very complicated
and long because they're steeped in legal ease.
I think the attorneys just like bills like that.
They do. Really complicated and long. They really
do. And they try to test us. You're going to
read this 75 -page bill? That's right. Are you
going to read the whole thing? Or what are you
going to do here? I get paid by the page. Exactly.
Well, Brad, thanks for the time. Thanks for dropping
in. My pleasure. It's good to see you. I'm sorry
that you didn't listen to any of the podcasts
from the summer. So you're going to have some
homework. Clearly, as soon as that came out of
my mouth, I knew I was going to be like, okay.
I'm going to quiz you. I'm going to say, okay.
I'm going to go rack these up. The September
podcast about this. Who was it with? I'm going
to have a whole host of questions. And I might
have some prizes for you if you get it right.
Well, see, now you're talking my language here
a little bit. I'm motivated by prizes. All right,
buddy. Good to see you. Likewise, Paul. Thanks
for everything. Yep. We'll see you soon. Take
care. Thanks for tuning in to County Connection.
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